New Delhi/Bhubaneswar, July 12: Politics seems to have cast its shadow on a crucial case in the Supreme Court involving the Odisha government.

The apex court today asked the Odisha law secretary to be present in court on July 31 to explain the state’s failure to field any lawyer to defend its case on a loan granted to Mesco that had resulted in a loss of Rs 40 crore to the state.

A bench, comprising Justices T.S. Thakur and Gyan Sudha Misra, directed that the law secretary be present to explain why the state government had failed to assign any lawyer to present its case.

The apex court in its order said: “This is a mining matter of some significance arising from Odisha. The Special Leave Petition was initially filed by Sibo Sankar Mishra, advocate on record, who was then followed by Suresh Chandra Tripathy. Today, when the matter was taken up for hearing neither Mr Mishra nor Mr Tripathy appeared….”

“We, therefore, passed over the matter and summoned Mr Tripathy to verify the reason for his non-appearance. Mr Tripathy appeared and submitted that since he is no longer in the panel for lawyers for the state, all briefs held by him was handed over to the concerned department,” it recorded.

“In the present case, the brief was handed over to an official of the mines department, whose name and address Mr Tripathy does not remember,” the bench said.

Tripathy, who was removed before the court’s summer recess, was ostensibly appointed at the instance of Rajya Sabha member, Pyari Mohan Mohapatra, who has fallen out with chief minister Naveen Patnaik. The rupture in their relations was complete in the wake of a failed coup against Naveen on May 29.

However, law secretary Debabrata Dash refused to subscribe to this view. He said Tripathy was removed because his conduct was not good. “Tripathy was terminated from that post. Despite our requests, he did not submit all the documents to either our resident commissioner in New Delhi or the state government,” said Dash.

Stating that the government, too, had failed to keep track of the case, Dash said the law department had received the go ahead from the chief minister to move the Bar Council of India against Tripathy. “We will also lodge an FIR if he fails to submit all the documents. We will make our stand clear to the apex court once we get a copy of its order,” he added.

The case relates to a loan given to Mesco to set up a project in the state. The high court had directed the state to order a CBI probe into it after Mesco failed to set it up. The loss to the state was around Rs 40 crore.

The state has an entire panel of lawyers to defend its cases in the top court. This includes R.S. Jena, Shibashish Mishra, Kirti Mishra, C.K. Sucharita and Sandhya Goswami. Contacted over phone, Jena said he appeared in all cases assigned to him “diligently”, but this was not assigned to him.

Shibashish Mishra, who along with Tripathy and Jena appeared in the mining cases, blamed the top court order today on the “confusion” following Tripathy’s removal as standing counsel.